reynolds-the-quran-in-its-historical-context-2

328 Devin J. Stewart(Q 101:9-11), the last two verses have been added as a gloss in order tothe meaning of the obscure word hawiyah. 14 I would argue, to the contrary,one of the conventional structures of pre-Islamic oracular texts, which wasadopted in the Qur'an, involved (1) presentation of an ambiguous termby (2) the rna adraka question about the term and then (3) an explanation ofword. 15 A parodic, patently falsified oracular pronouncement attributedthe prophet Maslamah b. ijabib- known in Islamic tradition as "MusaylimahLiar" - includes this conventional structure:al-fil *rna l-fil * wa-ma adraka rna l-fil * lahu mishfanm taw!! * wa-dfzanahz,athfl * wa-ma dhaka min khalqi rabbina bi-qalflThe elephant, * What is the elephant? * And how do you know whatelephant is? * It has a long trunk, *And a noble tail, * And that is not aexample of our Lord's creation. 16This text is intended to ridicule Musaylimah and provide evidence for reiectionhis prophetic status, so it cannot be accepted "as authentic. However, theof the piece probably represents legitimate awareness of the literary ''~'"n""'"t;n,of such oracular statements. Generally, in order for parody to be successful,must conform closely in formal terms to the target genre but be distorted ·some way. This oracle is distorted by rendering the enigmatic event that looms··the future as something concrete, an animal with its well-known, ch;ara.cte:ristiiphysical features, but the rna adraka construction may be taken to be anpart of the pre-Islamic soothsaying repertoire.The rna adraka construction occurs many times in the Qur' an, sometimes infull form, as is the case in Qur'an 99:1-3, where the ambiguous term is al-qariwhich means, literally, "the thing that knocks" (also Q 69:1-3; 82:14-19) · ·sometimes in truncated form (Q 74:26-27; 83:7-8; 83:18-19; 86:1-2; 90:197:1-2; 104:4-5). Many ofthese ambiguous words are feminine adjectivesas nouns, and many take the form of active participles, especially of thefo 'ita: al-waqi 'a "that which befalls" (Q 56:1 ), al-l;aqqa "that which willtably befall" (Q 69:1-3), 17 and, as previously mentioned, al-qari'a (Q 91:1From the Arabic lexicon, and from other texts such as hadfth it is evidentsimilar feminine participial forms came to mean "misforhme, affliction,particularly mu.yzba, literally, "that which hits the mark," the most common14 R. Bell, A Commentary on the Qur'iin, ed. C.E. Bosworth and M.E.J. Richardson, Ma1~cht:ster.University of Manchester, 1991,2:577.15 See Welch, "al-Kur'an," 5:422.16 Abii Sulayman al-Kbattabi (d. 388/998), Bayiin i'jiiz al-Qur'iin, 9-72, in Thaliith rasii'ilftal-Qur'iin, Mul)ammad Khalaf Allah Al:tmad and Mui)ammad Zaghliil Sallam (eds), Cairo:al-Ma'arif, 1976,55.17 Pickthall's rendition, "The Reality," seems obviously wrong, as it does not denote an eventgoing to occur or a disaster that is going to strike.Mysterious letters and other features of the Qur'an 329"disaster" in Arabic. However, there are many others, such as hamma "that· befalls, disaster," which occurs in a protective charm attributed to theu 'rdhuhu min al-hamma wa-l-samma, wa-k:ulli 'aynin lamma, "I askJrotection for him from the disaster, from that which poisons, and from every'"'".uu•uu"' eye." 18 These adjectival terms are meant to be ambiguous - that isa convention of the genre. The rna adraka structure that follows them is.• -..c,uvua• as well; it is in all likelihood original to the text and was not addedlater date. The whole structure functions to present something mysterious and· explain what it is after a delay, often with some ambiguity or mysteryThe much-discussed form hawiya (Q 101:9), which is intentionallyuu11~uu•u:;. may be understood as a cognate substitution for the form huwwah or·"'"""''"'·meaning "an abyss" in general and referring here to Hell. The word'sis determined by the rhyme-context in which it occurs, and it may bewith other ambiguous Qur'iinic terms for Hell such as saqar, lQJa, and19aspect of the Qur'iinic text that seems odd in comparison with the texts of•~ ,.T-'---·· Bible and the New Testament is the frequent use of the introductorythe singular imperative "say," an intrusive sign that the text has been relatedProphet by a third party. The speech is neither the direct address of a divinenor an unmediated narrative told by the Prophet himself.2° This literaryof the Qur'an is likely connected with the pre-Islamic convention, amongpoets and soothsayers, of relaying texts and literary inspirations supposedlyfrom genies or familiar spirits, which would then have been presented inmanner. These imperatives addressed to the Prophet are among many featuresQur' an that convey a claim to mantic authority, for they suggest that the textrevelations is not the Prophet's own speech. In the standard interpretation,inspiration of the Prophet occurs through the angel Gabriel and not through aor daemon, but the formal feature may be seen as the remaining vestige of amode of transmission for extraordinary messages. 21's "Beauteous Names" (al-asma' al-l;usna) also reveal a connection with'""'"'o••a•lllv religious tradition. These names are understood by many to be uniqueIslam. They appear on decorative posters and plaques, and they have even been· into popular devotional music, but they derive most notably fromig-JJJhra.ses at the ends of many verses of the Qur'an. A broader perspectivethat al-asma ' al-l;usna are divine epithets similar to those found in manyreligious traditions, including the mythology of the Greeks, ancient Nearreligions, Hinduism, and others - Athena the Victorious, Apollo the.L/c,~u,,vca. and so on. The phrase al-asma' al-l;usna is a technical term already inIbn al-Athir, al-Mathal al-sii'ir, 1:210-11.. Stewart, "Pit," EQ, 4:100-04; idem, "Poetic License in the Qur'an: Ibn al-:;la'igh al-I;Ianafi'slbkiim al-Riiy ft Abkiim al-Ay," JQS 11.1, 2009, 1-56, esp. p. 21.. Welch, "al-Kur'an," 5:422; D.A. Madigan, The Qur'iin's Self-Image: Writing and Authority in· .. Islam's Scriplllre, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001, 64-65.D.J. Stewart, "Soothsayer," EQ, 5:78-80.